The Ringtale Notes.....XI

The Butterflies And Elephants I Sleep With.

My Dear Butterfingers,

I was only passing by when I happened to notice her dance in the silence of the dance studio. The only music I heard was the sound waves of her body movements; feet gliding across the floor like a paint brush on Da Vinci's board painting the Mona Lisa; hands floating like she was one with the wind, for a moment there I swear I thought I saw her take flight as if she was looking for her heart and only heaven had the answers. I stood there mesmerized and I felt butterflies in my stomach...it also felt just a bit awkward, especially when she noticed me. I wanted to say something, trust me I did, something hot just to break the ice or something lame like how normal boys would do. Something like, "hey there little miss sunshine, has anyone ever told you that you're a thief? A beautiful thief in fact. When you move it's like you're robbing the bank of my chest of its most priced possession, so forgive me if I act a little heartless and I'm late with my compliments, it's just that you've stolen my heart. I guess what I really mean is, your beauty is like a Tanzanite, it's a rare discovery."

But I didn't say anything, the words never actually came out. So I contracted back to the confines of my little box, where the imagery I just saw only ends at the fibres of my spectacles, turned into a song I heard when I wasn't listening echoing sparingly into oblivion. And the butterflies in my stomach turned into elephants that take over my bed while I sleep on the floor with my poems cuddling. Dreaming about pickup lines that never really pick up anything except the space in my manuscripts and that giggle I always make when I write them. The thing is, my dear Butterfingers, I've never really been a sucker for love like Cupid in his nappies, his arrows were always deflecting off my heart-lock, cause my old man told me that true love is for pansies. He did that with the silence of his absence. So little girls never stood any chances, I only took what I wanted from them and never gave anything back. How can a young man know how to love if he never experienced it himself as a minor? Our hearts are like ticking time bombs, ready to explode and cave themselves in at the first sight of vulnerability. I still ask myself, 'how come out of all the girls I dated I never truly love any of them?' It was all a game, it was a gamble like the game of dice and my soul was the price. I guess we never really know the cost until we pay. At the end, true love is a drug and we all crave it, so I figured that's why most men lock themselves into solitude confinements, because it scares us so much when we finally find it.

I don't really know how to express my emotions, God knows, I always tell Him every day on my daily devotions. For more than two decades now I've never been able to tell my mother how much I really love her, so how could I tell a girl that I barely know? Pour my heart out into hers to liven up her face with a smile, to let my soul speak to hers like how God speaks to mine, letting our spirit connect in a perfect fit like the stars and the Universe. I'm not even sure if that's possible. So I made a vow that I would not be like my dad, do the kinda things that he did. Disconnected from his emotions and misguided in his ways like unwarranted dispositions. I pray every day not to end up like that. But instead my faith and hope I keep in God, to teach me how to love and act right. That one day I may be able to approach a girl at the library of God's wisdom, decode an arithmetic that will make her smile, opening the door to her heart and letting it speak to mine. And I'll know, Beauty has finally won the uninterrupted eye of the Beholder.

Its grace thought, that gets us there Butterfingers, nothing else. God is our Father from whom we're to learn how to love, but not only that, but also how to express that love through both emotions and actions.

Let's keep catching the little foxes...

Yours Affectionate Brother In Arms,

Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument.

The Ringtale Notes.....X

Of Pearly Moons And Shining Stars.

My Dear Butterfingers,

"Give me the night to speak to when all eyes are closed and the crickets sing tunes of my insecurities..." Is a phrase I once heard from a close friend of mine. His name was Sir Nicholas. He said these words sitting on the window of our dungeon basement where creativity knew no limit but traveled on every starlight we gazed upon. He paused for a moment, as if contemplating what he would actually say to the night as it besieged the throes of our inert situations. Reminding us both of the Beauties we had seen, and coercing us speak about the butterflies that had occupied our stomachs. We found a haven in that night as the moon rose to it's full strength. He spoke about the damsel that he had unwittingly given his heart to, I also spoke of mine, basically we were men without chests, heartless and at the mercy of these Beauties. He also spoke about how he messed up a relationship that almost was because of fear of the unknown. The thing is, he wasn't sure of what he wanted to do next, she was sure of what she wanted but not of where she was going, and so the entanglement of unspoken broken promises and this delving into confusion put everything into a halt. His heart was smitten, but circumstances had an entirely different view to it. It had nothing to do with love itself, but had everything to do with destiny, Kinda like what happened to me as well. The comrade (the girl I liked, we used to call her that, but as to why? I really don't remember) and I had different paths in life, and if we had forced things, we would quenched each other's destinies. And when one thinks about it now, it's moments like those that grows you and makes your stronger as person, a friend, and as a lover to be (one day is one day).

I guess I'm writing to you my dear Butterfingers to remind us that, sometimes we might think we've found the beauty, only to realise how truly incompatible your paths are. We meet different people heading to different direction in life all the time. 'Cause life is a highway congested by crisscrossing destinies, and not everyone coming your way is really moving in the direction you're moving in. Look, I'm not an expect of love at all, but in my years of single-hood and waiting, I've learnt that eventually God brings someone along you, moving in the same direction you're also moving in. And even if things are unclear at first, if it's a love story written by Him, everything inevitable falls into place.

"...when my dreams are lost, awakened from them by singing frogs with choruses of bad days and life gone astray with no time to pray, give me the night..." God is that Night we can speak to when we feel that our heart and efforts on love have been betrayed by reality as He is the one who weaved it into being. He is that spark and that shooting star pointing us to the direction, out of our aching heart in the hands of fading beauties, and into a new sunrise, a new day made for those who are patient.

Look upon Him now even more in your distress my dear Butterfingers, the beauty awaits our arrival into the center of His heart.

With love, I always pray for you ...


Your Affectionate Brother In Arms,
Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument

Zandile (They Increased).

A Journey Of Fate, Grace, And Peace.

A friend of mine recently told me that I seem to be gifted in the art of turning ordinary stories into great stories...I blushed a little. But then I've been thinking, isn't it possible that we all might have been birthed with the ability to turn our normal daily activities into poetic psalms of genius in the hands of God, the master Poet? Instead we've been well skilled by society in the ability of taking extraordinary stories and turning them into the ordinary. In every story of life, in every circumstance, there's always something extraordinary in it, the problem is just that we've learned to only look at the gloom of the situation.

About 11 months ago, I had a very interesting conversation with my grandma. She spoke of her life as a youth, basically contrasting it with our current age, the privileges that we have but have failed to recognize. She told me that life is not worth living when you do not know God. She sat on her grass mat as she recalled the trails and tribulations of her beautiful life. She got married at the age of 20, only to discover that she was barren, told that she would never bare a child. Despised by the in-laws, she was sideline as wife in a polygamous relationship. Verbally abused with words that covered her heart with scars. But she had always been a praying woman, so she found God in the midst of all that.

Years later, she received her blessing, she fell pregnant with her first child, but sadly a soul that never got to see the light. With the second one, she only got to hear it cry only once before the curtains came closing in. And after nine pregnancies (my mom is the last one) with 4 kids lost at infancy, she sat there on her grass mat knitting her heart into solitude, glancing at the sky she smiled, and then spoke of the joy she had found in God and how in her fading years she looking forward to see her King. Her mane is Zandile (which means 'they increased'), which was prophetic really, considering the amount of kids she ended up having (5 who are still alive). She saw her life beyond the ordinary endeavors of a house wife, but in the perspective of the one who wrote it.

She said to me, ''there have been days that have not been kind and nights that have not been warm enough to take comfort in. There have been sunrises I've never looked forward to, gasping st the hands of dawn in fear of the inevitable fate that has it's foot stuck in my front door. And there have been sunsets I've hurried to, I kept chasing the wind to catch the dream fading away in the midst of moonlights while there was still a flicker of hope left. Yet paddling through my journey, in the midst of the dark tunnel, He is the light that I met shinning above the rest. I met a new day, a bright sun to light up my mornings, and a shinning star to light up my path at night. God had arrived and couldn't be denied His place...And it's amazing to see, how trouble to him be simply things with mystery within, to shine His face, the light of His glory revealed, giving birth to faith for those willing to receive. To know the love, the beauty from above that no heartbeat can escape."


Be extraordinary in your ordinary circumstances and when you tell your story, it will surely be extraordinary.




Keep Thinking!
Sources: The Life of An Ordinary Housewife

The Ringtale Notes....IX

In Like A Madman Out Like A Lover.

My Dear Butterfingers,

I thought I should write to you, lest I be seen as ignorant of your current turmoil. It saddens me that you and the first lady have decided to part ways, romantically so. I believe I've never failed to make my admiration of what you guys had known, so beautiful, so exciting and nostalgic at the same time. Resembling both something from the old and something from the new.

They've always said that love is timeless, but I guess that when time catches up all things come to a halt. I remember 4 years ago when  you first confessed that there's a damsel you've fallen for. The mad rush of excitement and anticipation of what could be. I'll forever remember those young days in your new found love, even the songs we sang that night "Beautiful woman" and "it's a rollercoaster" all spontaneous from a place where love resided. And I guess we were all taken on rollercoaster ride of emotions by those pretty ladies. All the time spent with them only proved to solidify what we felt. Like fools we rushed in, we gave ourselves over to love, mine didn't last long, yours survived for 4 years. When I let the comrade go, it was for love's sake, and as much as it was painful, it was the best thing for both of us. When you let the first lady go, it was for peace's sake, her peace of mind as well as you own peace of mind. Which I think it's the best thing for you both, and I know it must hurt, but that's how it always is when you truly loved someone.

My dear Butterfingers, love turned us into madman and then took us on a ride, drawing us in, into her bosom. But I don't regret all the time invested and the heart poured into it even if it didn't work, cause at the end we came out as a lover. Knowing what it means to love someone and have them love you back, nothing comes close to it. We were created to love and to be loved, and it's only Author who created us who know our perfect fit. So I have now inclined to waiting at the library of God's wisdom, that when I met meet a her, I may open my heart and let hers speak to mine, saying "where have you've? I've been waiting here, forever."

Stay strong Butterfingers, love is an amazing journey, and like any journey, there are bumps in the road.


Yours Affectionate Brother In Arms,

Ringtale, Still The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument.

Fleeting Memory

Life always has the tendency to try and make us forgetful of the things that really matters in the greater spectacle of time. Some old friendships are forgotten, some experiences that have made us who we are today lie dormant in the scraps of our memories, and the lessons learned become ancient knowledge. It is not a lie that we always try and better ourselves cause most of us, if not all, feel we were meant for something greater that what our lives offer. But I believe it is a lie when we think that our ceaseless pursuit of consumption, whether it be knowledge, wealth or pleasure itself, will ultimately lead us into a place satisfaction. Most people who have reached the top, in terms of success according to the human interpretation of the word, they will tell that once you reach the top you'll find there's nothing there. And it's true, I mean if you look at the life of our beloved celebrities, it leaves nothing to be desired, cause in life meaninglessness doesn't come from being weary of pain, but meaninglessness comes from being weary of pleasure. Just when you thought you've found something that would ultimately satisfy you, you find that it actually leaves you even more empty. And all our effort of consumption become a fleeting memory, epic fails we want to quickly forget.

Now in trying to figure out what drives us to such futile exercises, I wrote the following entry;

"So when they hent him by the hand and trust him out, I took a lute and sang over again the songs of my own composing which the damsel had sung. A mistress in distress who just lost her love, now obliviously a fleeting memory in the underbelly of everyday dementia of the young and restless. Stoke about finding utopia in the senseless. They said YOLO, so you can live life like the demented, in the nostalgic dreams of the perverted. The old folks talk about the times, while we're trying to finding flimsy lifestyles, getting dribbled by nipples, then blame the past times for leaving moral cripples. The fast life told beauty to lie in the eyes of the beholder, with hearts so stone cold, insinuating the human heart become colder. In all, distressed damsels forsake true love for jilly jollying with lustful minds cause they mixit. Shunning the bread of life and giving Him a cold shoulder. The death of reason buried the truth in our hearts and cause our eyes not to see the light when it rose..."

If I may add again, what we normally think will bring us a satisfying end usually leaves us more empty. Therefore, I keep asking myself, why am I trying to live up to such standards that provide no end to my toiling? So since there's one undeniable fact about life is that at the end we're all dead. And at that point what matters the most is what you leave behind. Will my legacy be that of another passing soul without purpose or use? Just a lonely traveler only alive in fading memories. Or would it mean something to those I would leave behind? But even then every journey of self discovery starts with a single step, as we paint our mark in wider canvass which ahs a meaning far more important than our own. I too, am tempted to selfish at times, to think for number one, to think for the now,

But...

One day we will be old and we'll think about the stories we could have told.

Keep Thinking!
Sources: The Memoirs of Euclid, The Wordsmith

The Ringtale Notes....VIII

Of Hope and Cynicism

My Dear Butterfingers,

I must confess to a certain curiosity with why things turn out as they do. I have read the scripts history reveals to us, the past turn to show us the plot of where we're heading to. I've even heard one man say 'all new news is old news happening to new people.' And being of a particular age, I was raised with a certain degree of optimism. With the shackles of childhood broken, once again we could get back to the normal business of pursuing happiness, love and success, which at the time we though it was going to be easy. However optimism is not hope, yet it is a recurring feature of life in good times. It is also a feature that all to quickly vanishes and reveals itself for what it is when bad times return.

My friend, my heart has been growing heavy when I look back on all the friendships that ended abruptly due to the emotional concoction that wanted to take these relationships to a world created for romance, Eden, yet instead left a trail of butterflies our stomachs and a lot of elephants in the room. But I must thank God that instead of growing cynical from such historical awakenings, I found hope and a space to breadth in these suffocated rooms. When hope fades, cynicism is often waiting in the wings. And this is indeed one of the great challenges for us. Skepticism (there is nothing good and I know it) and cynicism (I can’t trust anybody or anything and I know this) seem reasonable choices. But is this a necessary outcome or orientation for us? I think not. Yet, if we have bought into a rationalist vision, if we have embraced the vision and values of our age uncritically, if faith is merely a part-time investment in an over cluttered life, then perhaps we don’t have the necessary orientation or resolve to face the issues and challenges of our time.

The moments will be awkward, and most of the times frustrating. The memories will be haunting, and the journey even more tough cause of the heart that grows weary with every step. But the hope that we have, that of Eden, where, after many years of hopeless wondering, God will be re-enacting the two souls that were meant to be. For now it going to be tough, I now  it is, but the scripts that are revealed by history (His-story) are the learning and building blocks that are there to equip and better us, instead of shooting us down, lingering in broken hearts and tainted emotions.

May the Beauty be patient with us, as we are only young men growing daily in the heartbeat of God.



Yours Affectionate Brother In Arms,

Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument

The Ringtale Notes.....VII

Punctuated Equilibrium...

My Dear Butterfingers,

Ever since I heard that beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder, I've been looking for the one whom she tells the truth to. Because, perhaps, finding that being will bring rest to my turmoil of searching for the beauty itself. And it's a quest not without hassles and tussles. But my negativity has pushed me beyond insanity and the peer pressure masculinity I thought I had already fought through. For months on end, I've put my ear to the ground, to listen through the cracks, to hear her footprints when she comes beating with God's own scintillating pace. It was as if my fear of getting into a bad relationship was drawing me towards the wrong exit. When they said 'you must live for the moment', I began to forget about the future in an instance, and what's at stake when following the path of pretense. Yet I saw them eat crumbs of love, live life on a high and let reality escape them like those youth on drugs. I've seen them all around me, their stories remain long like graffiti, the streets tells them all without mutiny. And having learned the lessons from all these unsuccessful relationships, I've come to a conclusion that all relationships, whether it be a friendship or a romantic one, are meaningless when there's no purpose, direction and the common courtesy of respect. Trust becomes intrinsic. When these are violated, our journey of love becomes one that is marked by signposts of sex slaves, premature parenthood, getting dribbled by nipples and tingled in a cluster of mistakes and heartbreaks. Really, we all get lost to fallible courses. Some people you meet they love you today and leave you tomorrow ululating in sorrow, their infidelity makes loud noises. So at all times I guard myself that, I too, don't walk around carrying love on hormone lustful bags, dragging my soul to refuse bins like filthy rags.

Marriage is a wonderful and sacred engagement, and I believe in all relationship that should be an end goal. And if beauty keeps lying in the eyes of the beholder, and the end, when the beauty fades, she'll have nothing left except her lies. While the beholder will be drenching in his foolishness, having lost the very thing that brought a smile to his heart and completion in his eyes. The harmony, brought by the One whom she tells the truth to, becomes lost if both the beauty and beholder loss sight of the One. At the end they'll both be staring at the hollow mirrors of their squandered youth.

My friend, one thing for sure is that the young and restless die cold and alone, and I don't wanna experiment with human hearts so much that I end up becoming numb to the real thing when it finally comes. So it is important to stay true to God, that our love towards the beauty becomes unconditional, even when she doesn't deserve it.
My journey towards the beauty still continues my friend, by gazing more on the One we all tell the truth to, whether willingly or not, and knowingly or not.

P.S. Now regarding your letter you sent during the week, it was gladly received and I shall write to you and give you feedback soon.


Yours Affectionate Brother In Arms;
Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument

The Ringtale Notes........VI

A Friendship Rendered...

My Dear Butterfingers,

My friend, I thought to write to once again, an excerpt from my journal of a friendship once held dear but now lies in the face of oblivion. She left, he stayed, life moved on to tell other story while the end to others still hanged in the balance, whether awaiting an unexpected twist, or just preparing to play out the credits...

She set her face like a flint, on her path, moving on from the cascade of protracted dream she once held true. Him, now a fleeting memory. Feelings of years past fled like a dew in the midst of sunrise, forgetfulness has left her in a daze. Perhaps, the possibilities that now stare her jarringly in the face are oblivious to the memories she once held true. Him, her, them together, the joy, the wonder, she now finds it hard to remember. So where to from here? the question beckons. An answer which, maybe, cannot be found lingering on bathroom mirrors where she leaves her reflection every morning hoping that when she comes back it would have found the answers. The things that were left unsaid now seem to be making loud noises in their silence. Arrangements overlooked, distant echoes of 'I miss you' that were never turned into a sound-beat to bring rhythm to their love song, and the time stolen by the 'busyness' that lazied the attempts to reconnect. His heartbeat skipped a beat, whipped, leading to loss of breadth in disbelief, memories is all he has now. She left, he stayed. She left not knowing where. She had lost patience in what was certain, wondrous in possibilities and what is enchanted, for the uncharted. He stayed, not knowing for what. He had to let go of what was real and true, to perhaps journey to what  will be, when times opens her hands to reveal her intentions. But for now, he's staying, and she's leaving...perspective comes when two pole are apart far enough to have horizons at both end.

You and I know very well, my dear Butterfingers, of this pain of having to let go of some friendships. While we wait for our First Ladies, such an exercise is one that defines the true from the rest. How we respond is very pivotal to character building. And I've also learned that not everyone is the right one for us, no matter how right it feels.

May our emotions guide us as far as they should and our minds also carry us as far as they should, while God carries us from the start to finish.


Yours Affectionate Brother in Arms,

Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument.
Dated: 15 September 2013

The Sacred Romance

Vanity Fair

Today I wanna share a except that change my life in terms of my journey to a sacred romance with God, it's from the book The Sacred Romance by John Eldredge.

"Don't be afraid of embracing the disappointment you feel, old or new. Don't be scared of the unreasonable joy either. They're the highway markers home."

We snort with disdain at such quaint sentiments, and our choice made, strike off down the straight highway of discipline and duty. All goes well for a while, sometimes for years, until we begin to realize that we're really not feeling much anymore. We find ourselves struggling to weep with those who weep or even rejoice with those who rejoice. Mostly we don't bother looking people in the eye. They may want to engage us and nothing much inside feels very engaged. Our passions begin to show up in inappropriate fantasies and longings interspersed with depression, anxieties, and anger we thought we had left behind. With a start, we realize our heart has stolen away in the baggage. It is taking the journey with us but under protest.
We redouble our efforts at discipline to get it to knuckle under but it refuses. Some of us finally kill it well enough that it no longer speaks as long as we're occupied. Any quasiredemptive busyness will do. We look as if we're still believing. Others of us decide the deadness is too high a price to pay and agree to let our heart have a secret life on the side. We even try to be passionate about our faith but the fiery embers that once sustained it have turned to cool gray ash, the evidence that life was indeed once present.
We find ourselves at the same place of heart resignation we left so many years ago before we were Christians. We arrive at the Vanity Fair that John Bunyan describes in The Pilgrim's Progress. It is a familiar city populated with many of the companions we had hoped to leave behind: deadness of spirit, lack of loving-kindness, lust, pride, anger, and others. Nonetheless, having been out on the Christian journey for a number of years by now, we assume that this is as close to the Celestial City as we're ever going to get. We set up housekeeping and entertain ourselves as well as possible at the booths in the Fair that sell a variety of soul curiosities, games, and anesthetics.
The curiosities sold at the fair are endless in their diversity, many of them good in and of themselves: Bible study, community service, religious seminars, hobbies we try to convince ourselves are eternally transcendent (e.g., "Wow, I can't wait to ski deep powder!"), service to our church, going out to dinner. But we find ourselves doing them more and more to quiet the heart voice that tells us we have given up what is most important to us.

Keep Thinking!

The Ringtale Notes....V

Of Dust, A Journey of Being...

My Dear Butterfingers,

A friend of mine once said "Every thing will always fall into place once the timing is right..." Last night I was reminded of how somethings, even if they were meant to be, if their timing is rushed they end up impaling us, though on their own they might be good, and our hearts become collateral. It's harsh reality really that keeps us in check, that we're not oblivious to fact that we should always be dependant unto God for the precise timing of things. So the scramble tangle continues, the likes, the mishaps, new friendship, the end of old friendships are all not without a cost really. 'Cause some make you question the way you build friendships,is it good? is it bad? If so, how to change&make sure you build correctly. But all in all, the lessons are learned and then we move on from there having grown and bettered by the experiences. One side note though, is that sometimes all these experiences can make you despondent when the right person and timing comes along because of fear of making the same mistakes. And so we might miss the moment and end up with the wrong person. My friend, there's a few things that can test our faith in Christ other than this issue of relationships.

So who will the 'one' be? Where is she? And how will i know when I see her? In all honesty, I don't know. But one thing I know, God is always faithful, firstly to prepare us and then to provide. I'm reminded of Adam and how God provided. He was of dust but made in the Image, and she was woven from the fabric of Adams' being, made for no one else but for him. And I still believe that's what God has for us, someone made only for us, amidst many potentials, there is but one.

It's a journey, which sometimes peer pressure can render insurmountable. It's a journey of being, who we are in God that we might also find the one whose being also is in God.

I have to say, you inspire me my friend, you and the First Lady. I'm glad that once again there's harmony between you too. And i eagerly await the day that i will be a best man in your official union. My prayers are always with you. Also send my love to her.


Yours Affectionate brother in Arms,

Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument.

A Slice Of Infinity III

The Quiet Act of Attention

Wendell Berry has written a poem that haunts me frequently. As a creative writer, the act of paying attention is both a spiritual and professional discipline. But far too often my aspirations for paying quality attention to everything dissolves into something more like attention deficit disorder. As it turns out, it is quite possible to see and not really see, to hear and not really hear. And this is all the more ironic when my very attempts to capture what I am seeing and hearing are the thing that prevent me from truly being present. Berry’s poem is about a man on holiday, who, trying to seize the sights and sounds of his vacation by video camera, manages to miss the entire thing. …he stood with his camera preserving his vacation even as he was having it so that after he had had it he would still have it. It would be there. With a flick of a switch, there it would be. But he would not be in it. He would never be in it.(1) I sometimes wonder if one of the most quoted sayings of Jesus is not often employed with a similar irony. “Consider the lilies,” Jesus said, “how they grow; they neither toil nor spin. Yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field…will he not much more clothe you? Therefore, do not worry” (Matthew 6:28-31). Typically, Jesus is quoted here as giving a helpful word against worry. And he is. But worry is not the only command he articulates here.Consider the lilies, he said. Many of us hear the first instruction peripherally, hurriedly, as mere set up for the final instruction of the saying. And in so doing, we miss something great, perhaps even something vital, both in the means and in the end. With our rationalistic sensibilities, we gloss over consideration of the lilies; ironically, in an attempt to consider the real work Jesus is describing. But what if considering the lilies is the work, the antidote to anxious, preoccupied lives? What if attending to beauty, to the ephemeral, to the fleeting details of a distracted world is a command Jesus wants us to take seriously in and of itself? It is with such a conviction that artist Makoto Fujimura not only paints, but elsewhere comments on Mary and her costly pouring of perfume on the feet of Jesus. The anger of Judas and the disgust of the others are all given in rational terms, the cacophony of their reactions (and likely ours) attempting to drown out her quiet act of attention: That bottle would have cost over a year’s wages… The poor could have used that money… This sinful woman clings to a holy man’s feet… Does he not see who it is who touches him? Their responses to her and to her act of beauty exposes their own inattention to a world beyond the one they see—to their own peril. As Fujimura writes, “Pragmatism, legalism, and greed cannot comprehend the power of ephemeral beauty. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness; the opposite of beauty is legalism. Legalism is hard determinism that slowly strangles the soul. Legalism injures by giving pragmatic answers to our suffering.” The corollary, of course, is that beauty can offer healing; that paying attention, even to fleeting glimpses of glory, is deeply restorative. When Jesus asks the world quite counter-culturally to consider the lilies, to consider beauty in the midst of all the ashes around us, his request is full of promise, for he is both the Source of beauty and its Subject. Paying attention to the ephemeral, being willing like Mary to risk and to recognize beauty, is in and of itself restorative because it is paying attention to him—to Christ—one easily dismissed, having no form or majesty that we should look at him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him, one rationally rejected, having been struck down, afflicted, led like a lamb to slaughter. Here, both the anxiety-addicted and the attention-overloaded can find solace in a different sort of kingdom: one in which there is room for the paradox of a fleeting world with eternity in its soul and in its soil, for death at a Roman cross to somehow be horrifically beautiful. But perhaps Jesus also instructs the world to consider the lilies because it ischaracteristic of God’s concern for the world. The daily liturgy of lilies comes with unceasing care and attention for all who will see it, the gift of a God who revels in the creation of yet another flower, the details of another sunset, the discovery of even one lost soul. Consider the lilies; how they grow. They neither toil, nor spin.

The Ringtale Note....IV

My dear Butterfingers,

I thought it best to write to you again in order to have some sort of accountability going. If i remember correctly, last time we spoke I told you about the breakdown of my friendship with the lady friend my heart was warming up to last year. I must say it gives a sense of warmth to inform that we have managed to settle our differences and our friendship is starting to become healthy again. Throughout all this toil my Butterfingers, I've learnt valuable lessons, and the most important one has been patience. Patient with God and patient with the people I've invited to be part of my life. And as I reflect on all my likes, the saying that 'men have an infinite capacity to like' has been evident. I know you were very excited to hear about my last 'like', but it was not to be. Although we might have felt strongly about it, it seems God had other plans, and it's better to always follow God's plan even when the heart disagrees cause He always has the best for us. 

The journey has been difficult though I must say, and as much as it has been hard to wait, but I must. This season of single-hood is a gift I must cherish, and it's a time I must spend with God. 

I will write to you again shortly to keep you updated. Please send my regards to the First Lady, your company and her cooking is well missed my friend. 

Keep well, and remember Patience Is A Virtue.

Your Brother In Arms,

Ringtale, The Guy Who Plays A Certain Instrument.

A SLICE OF INFINITY 2

The Mystery of Faith

Long before Horatio Caine or Gil Grissom made crime scene investigating a primetime enterprise, the Bloodhound Gang was “there on the double” “wherever there’s trouble,” a doughty group of junior detectives who used science to solve crimes. Written by Newbery Medal-winning children’s author Sid Fleischman, the Bloodhound Gang was a beloved segment on the PBS television program 3-2-1 Contact, and my first encounter with the almost unbearable suspension, “To be continued.” Thankfully, with the help of their knowledge of science, no mystery remained unsolved for long. What I did not realize at the time, or through years of absorbing Unsolved Mysteries, CSI, and my own scientific pursuits, was the hold that simple word “solve” would have on my understanding of mystery. For the Bloodhound Gang, as much as for the philosophers of science who have given rise to the notion, science is the invasion and defeat of mystery. That is to say, for many scientists (though certainly not for all historically), mysteries are there to be solved and put finally beyond us. One can see how such a notion fuels the perception that science and faith are at odds with one another; science being the conquest of mystery and faith the act of making room for it. For Steven Pinker, Harvard Professor and cognitive scientist, certain aspects of religious belief can be thought of as “desperate measure[s] that people resort to when the stakes are high and they’ve exhausted the usual techniques for the causation of success.” In other words, religion, like the story of the stork for parents not ready for their kids to know where babies come from, is simply a desperate attempt to explain away mystery, even if only by making space for it. And faith is thus seen as the grossly inferior CSI agent. But what if mystery is less like a case for the Bloodhound Gang and more like the molecule of DNA they use to solve the crime? In so much of the culture in which we operate today, mystery is thought of in reductionistic terms. It is a momentary fascination that needs some higher reasoning, future information, or an hour of crime scene investigating to solve and explain. Everything we do technologically, medically, and scientifically is an attempt to put an end to mystery—to explain everything. But is that remotely possible? And would a reasonable explanation always dispel the mystery in the first place? As Thomas Huxley once put it, “[H]ow is it that anything so remarkable as a state of consciousness comes about as a result of irritating nervous tissue?” Is mystery always something to be solved? In fact, the Greek word ‘mysterion,’ from which we get the word “mystery” does not necessarily mean something that is concealed (and hence, in need of our solution). It can also mean something that is revealed—as in a secret. In other words, mystery is not a problem in need of resolution, a concealed issue in need of an explanation. But mystery in this sense is something shown or given, albeit in a surprising, obscure way. It is in this sense of the word that early church father Tertullian spoke of the mystery of faith and ceremonial acts that join the believer to Christ—namely, our baptisms into his life, death, and resurrection, our celebration and consumption of his body and blood. It is a mystery, a gift, a fuller life revealed. Faith is not a theological solution to mystery in the CSI sense of the word; it is the celebration of this mystery—indeed, The mystery. And at this, it is a mystery all the more captivating than those that can be solved in an hour or in a microscope. For it is a mystery that God has revealed to minds which don’t fully understand or yet fully see, a mystery worthy of a whole lifetime. It is mystery reminiscent of the words of Simone Weil: “God wears Himself out through the infinite thickness of time and space in order to reach the soul and to captivate it…it has in its turn, but gropingly, to cross the infinite thickness of time and space in search of Him whom it loves. It is thus that the soul, starting from the opposite end, makes the same journey that God made towards it. And that is the cross.” Every Sunday before holding the bread by which we remember all that has been revealed in Christ, all that has been given in the cross, whether seen in part or partly understood, Christians profess in unison the mystery of faith. It is a mystery that does not need my solution, a mystery that continues to surprise, to nourish, and to reveal itself in life and in death: Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again. Jill Carattini

A SLICE OF INFINITY

Journey of Dust

I walked through the neatly laid stones, each row like another line in a massive book. My eyes strained to take in all of the information—name, age, rank, country—and perhaps also death itself, the fragility of life, the harsh reality of war. In that field of graves, a war memorial for men lost as prisoners of war, slaves laboring to construct the Burma-Siam railway, I felt as the psalmist: “laid low in the dust.” Or like Job sitting among the dust and ashes of a great tragedy. Then one stone stopped my wandering and said what I could not. On an epitaph in the middle of the cemetery was written: “There shall be in that great earth, a richer dust concealed.”(1)

It is helpful, I think, to be reminded that we are dust. It seems crucial to take this reminder with us as we move through life—through successes, disappointments, surprises, distractions, tragedy. For Christians, it is also a truth to help us the vast and terrible events of Holy Week. The season of Lent, the forty days in which the church prepares to encounter the events of Easter, thankfully begins with the ashes of Ash Wednesday. On this day, foreheads are marked with a bold and ashen cross of dust, recalling both our history and our future, invoking repentance, inciting stares. Marked with the Cross, we are Christ’s own: pilgrims on a journey that proclaims death and resurrection all at once. The journey through Lent into the light and darkness of Holy Week is for those made in dust who will return to dust, those willing to trace the breath that began all of life to the place where Christ breathed his last. It is a journey that expends everything within us.

There is a Latin word that was once used to denote the provisions necessary for a person going on a long journey—the clothes, food, and money the traveler would need along the way. Viaticum was a word often used by Roman magistrates. It was the payment or goods given to those who were sent into the provinces to exercise an office or perform a service. The viaticum was vital provision for an uncertain journey. Fittingly, the early church employed this image to speak of the Eucharist when it was administered to a dying person. The viaticum, the bread of one’s last Communion, was seen as sustenance for Christians on their way from this world into another. Sometime later, the word was used not only to describe a last Communion, but as the Sacrament of Communion for all people. It is as if to say: our communion with Christ within world is provision for the way home. The viaticum is God’s answer to Jacob’s vow, “If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear so that I return safely to my father’s house, then the LORD will be my God.”(2) It is precisely what Christ offered when he said, “Take and eat. This is my body.” The journey from dust to dust and back to the Father’s house would be far too great without it.

The world of humanity is flattened by the realities of death and sorrow. From the invitation to consume Christ’s body and blood in the Last Supper to the desolation of that body on the Cross, we are undone by events that began before us and will continue long we are gone. We are, in the words of Isaiah or the sentiments of the psalmist, like grass that withers, flowers that blow away like dust. But so we are, in this great earth, a richer dust concealed. Walking in cemeteries we realize this; following Christ we can proclaim it. Walking through Lent as dust and ashes bids us to see our need for God’s unchanging provision. God offers us the Cross for the journey, the communion of Christ, the forgiveness of sins, and the life everlasting.


Jill Carattini